The real test awaits

We would have preferred to hail England's ninth successive victory in the Durban Test yesterday, but even if the match ended on an anti-climactic note when bad light stopped play, Michael Vaughan's team has had a sensational 2004. English cricket followers have grown used to a steady diet of abject surrender and batting collapses, but now the team displays a fighting spirit that complements the players' recent advances in technique. It is quite impossible to imagine an England team of 10 or 20 years ago fighting back from the dire position in which Vaughan's men found themselves after their first innings batting collapse earlier this week. But they bounced back with a spectacular second innings performance and were unlucky not to secure victory before dark clouds gathered over Durban yesterday afternoon, though credit is due to the South African batsmen for their tenacity.

It is a great tribute to the progress made in the past two or three years that England supporters now feel acute disappointment not to have won another Test match, when in years gone by the ambition tended to be no higher than to cling on for a draw. There are still concerns about the management of the game in England, notably the authorities' mishandling of Zimbabwe and the deplorable decision to auction live broadcast rights so that the game will almost be eliminated from terrestrial television. But the players, who have no say in these matters, should continue to keep their minds set on one of the most exciting prospects of next summer: a keenly fought and - we trust - finely balanced Ashes series.